Viewing ratings in Windows File Explorer

[jr_ed]

I just noticed that the star ratings I applied in Photo Mechanic are not appearing in the Ratings column in Windows File Explorer (either on the RAW .CR2 files or on the associated .XMP files).

Is there a preference setting or something that I'm missing to allow the ratings in Photo Mechanic to propagate to whatever Windows uses to display its ratings in Windows File Explorer, or is there a technical reason why this can't/shouldn't be done?

I'm running Photo Mechanic Version 5.0, build 15011 on a Windows 8.1 x64 machine.

[Kirk Baker]

I just noticed that the star ratings I applied in Photo Mechanic are not appearing in the Ratings column in Windows File Explorer (either on the RAW .CR2 files or on the associated .XMP files).

Is there a preference setting or something that I'm missing to allow the ratings in Photo Mechanic to propagate to whatever Windows uses to display its ratings in Windows File Explorer, or is there a technical reason why this can't/shouldn't be done?

I'm running Photo Mechanic Version 5.0, build 15011 on a Windows 8.1 x64 machine.

I don't know where Windows Explorer gets/puts its ratings, but we're putting it in XMP the same way Adobe's software does.  If Windows Explorer could be configured to use those values then they would show up.

-Kirk

[jr_ed]

Doing some further research, it appears that Windows is just not very good at dealing with XMP metadata in any consistent manner. The most detailed report I have found is here:

http://www.knowyourfiles.com/2009/10/xmp-in-windows-7-the-good-bad-ugly/

I also found some posts related to Adobe Lightroom that weren't as detailed, but seemed to suggest similar inconsistent behavior there. So at this point I'm not optimistic I will find a way to use Windows Explorer for viewing ratings effectively.